After 4 1/2 Years In Foreign Jail, Smuggler Gets 5-year Term

Lionel James Casey, An Ex-melbourne Resident Facing Drug Charges, Fought Extradition From Costa Rica Until Last Week. He May Soon Go Free.

April 22, 1993|By Jim Leusner of The Sentinel Staff

For 4 1/2 years, Lionel James Casey sat in a Costa Rican jail as he fought extradition to face cocaine-smuggling charges in Orlando.

Last week the former Melbourne resident waived extradition and returned to the United States. On Tuesday he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to five years in prison and fined $10,000 by U.S. District Judge G. Kendall Sharp in Orlando.

He may soon be a free man.

His lawyer, Robert Leventhal, said his client has served four years and seven months behind bars, far more than he would have served in a U.S. prison.

His sentence includes a provision that he be credited for time served in Costa Rica.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia Hawkins said Casey was the last remaining fugitive in a 1986 drug case involving several men who smuggled several hundred pounds of cocaine into Florida in 1981 and 1982.

Among those charged and sent to prison was Scott McKenney, 39, former head of the U.S. Customs Service patrol office at Port Canaveral.

Casey was accused of making two flights to Colombia to pick up 600 pounds of cocaine and ferry it to North Carolina and Florida, Hawkins said.